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An Ancient Trap
Engineer Jordan and the crew of the mining vessel Kirkland traveled a year to reach the MacReady system.
Following a lead from a prospecting satellite, the Kirkland deploys its mining operations on one of the system’s three planets.
From the moment they begin drilling through MacReady’s rocky surface and into the veins of precious metals, everything changes. Miners disappear, a disaster threatens the Kirkland, and Jordan finds himself fighting to save both his ship and the miners trapped on the surface of a planet that isn’t a planet.
From Paul E Cooley, author of The Black, The Derelict Saga, and Station 3, An Ancient Trap is a suspenseful sci-fi adventure that will make you shiver.
Following a lead from a prospecting satellite, the Kirkland deploys its mining operations on one of the system’s three planets.
From the moment they begin drilling through MacReady’s rocky surface and into the veins of precious metals, everything changes. Miners disappear, a disaster threatens the Kirkland, and Jordan finds himself fighting to save both his ship and the miners trapped on the surface of a planet that isn’t a planet.
From Paul E Cooley, author of The Black, The Derelict Saga, and Station 3, An Ancient Trap is a suspenseful sci-fi adventure that will make you shiver.
316 pages, Kindle Edition
Published February 22, 2024
About the author
Paul Elard Cooley
34 books256 followersPaul E Cooley is a full-time writer and Parsec Award Winning podcaster from Houston, Texas. In 2009, he began producing free psychological thriller and horror podcasts, essays, and reviews available from Shadowpublications.com and iTunes.
His stories have been listened to by thousands and he has been a guest on such notable podcasts as Podioracket, John Mierau‘s “Podcast Teardown,” Geek Out with Mainframe, Shadowcast Audio, and Vertigo Radio Live. In 2010, his short story Canvas and novella Tattoo were nominated for Parsec Awards. Tattoo became a Parsec Award finalist. He has collaborated with New York Times Bestselling author Scott Sigler on the series “The Crypt” and co-wrote the novella “The Rider” (projected to release in 2014). In addition to his writing, Paul has contributed his voice talents to a number of podiofiction productions.
He has two Amazon best-selling series: The Black and The Derelict Saga.
He is also a co-host on the renown Dead Robots’ Society writing podcast.
His stories have been listened to by thousands and he has been a guest on such notable podcasts as Podioracket, John Mierau‘s “Podcast Teardown,” Geek Out with Mainframe, Shadowcast Audio, and Vertigo Radio Live. In 2010, his short story Canvas and novella Tattoo were nominated for Parsec Awards. Tattoo became a Parsec Award finalist. He has collaborated with New York Times Bestselling author Scott Sigler on the series “The Crypt” and co-wrote the novella “The Rider” (projected to release in 2014). In addition to his writing, Paul has contributed his voice talents to a number of podiofiction productions.
He has two Amazon best-selling series: The Black and The Derelict Saga.
He is also a co-host on the renown Dead Robots’ Society writing podcast.
Ratings & Reviews
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
October 1, 2026
Good, but a bit confused on genre
This is a mostly well written book with a decent plot and relatable characters. These are normal, jaded folks thrust into a situation they don't want to be a part of and rising to the occasion.
But that's also a problem, there's a bunch of likeable characters and a set up for a multi-narrative approach that just doesn't happen.
This makes the first half of the book the best because you can see the suspense and tension building and all of the potential for when things start to unravel. But that potential just doesn't become a reality and when things start to happen it abandons the horror and suspense elements for fairly generic sci fi action adventure.
This should've been two different books. One dedicated to cosmic horror and one to the alien buddy adventure. Together it just doesn't work well.
The action is weird. These are supposed to be super advanced alien creatures built for war and they... punch each other.
It doesn't make that much sense and you just need to suspend disbelief and go with the adventure. As weird as it is.
This is good, casual reading. Could've been much better, but it was good enough.
This is a mostly well written book with a decent plot and relatable characters. These are normal, jaded folks thrust into a situation they don't want to be a part of and rising to the occasion.
But that's also a problem, there's a bunch of likeable characters and a set up for a multi-narrative approach that just doesn't happen.
This makes the first half of the book the best because you can see the suspense and tension building and all of the potential for when things start to unravel. But that potential just doesn't become a reality and when things start to happen it abandons the horror and suspense elements for fairly generic sci fi action adventure.
This should've been two different books. One dedicated to cosmic horror and one to the alien buddy adventure. Together it just doesn't work well.
The action is weird. These are supposed to be super advanced alien creatures built for war and they... punch each other.
It doesn't make that much sense and you just need to suspend disbelief and go with the adventure. As weird as it is.
This is good, casual reading. Could've been much better, but it was good enough.
April 3, 2024
Cool story. Paul E Cooley does space very well. He comes up with fantastic and believable technology, and interesting and "rootable" characters, and any alien life is sure to be creative and horrible. This was all true in this well told story. It was great. The only minus that I would say, is that for an impatient person like me, it took too long to get to the real action. I knew it was coming, the signs and feeling of dread was there, but it took a beat longer than I would have liked. When it came I was not disappointed. It was a good one.
April 6, 2025
Pretty good sci-fi horror mystery
For the most part this book was really good, but the ending faltered a little. There's plenty of mystery about the planet and what's going on. The main character Jordan isn't your stereotypical action hero, just a normal guy thrust into a nightmare scenario. Parasite was actually a really interesting character, not quite the villian it's initially made out to be. The ending did feel a bit rushed and confusing.
For the most part this book was really good, but the ending faltered a little. There's plenty of mystery about the planet and what's going on. The main character Jordan isn't your stereotypical action hero, just a normal guy thrust into a nightmare scenario. Parasite was actually a really interesting character, not quite the villian it's initially made out to be. The ending did feel a bit rushed and confusing.
May 16, 2025
Started good, then just got ridiculous
WAY too much description and detail. I would read pages over and over and could never in my mind see anything he was trying to describe. That’s basically 90% of the book. I was just breezing over everything at the end to get through it. It was everything I could do to not DNF.
WAY too much description and detail. I would read pages over and over and could never in my mind see anything he was trying to describe. That’s basically 90% of the book. I was just breezing over everything at the end to get through it. It was everything I could do to not DNF.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews